Site Type

Chiefdom

District

Province

Notes

The fortifications of Smith’s Hill (now known as Tower Hill) were built from 1792 to 1805. Inside the fort were the Governor’s
house, Government offices, such as the Post Office and the barracks for the garrison. When the buildings were being re-constructed
to make way for the new State House (the present building), the Commission thought it necessary to have the bastions proclaimed a
national Monument so as to incorporate them into the new building. Fort Thornton is in very good repair, but much restored from
the original, and beautifully laid out with well-maintained gardens. Several strategically placed cannons remind one of the
original purposes of the fortress. Unfortunately these cannons are now painted white, destroying their natural beauty and perhaps
their value as relics.

The first settlements by the Poor Blacks brought out in 1787 by Captain Thompson, R.N. were dispersed by the hostile acts of King
Jimmy, and it was quite natural that one of the early acts of the second set of Colonists (the Nova Scotians under Lieutenant
Clarkson, R.N., the first Governor), should be to consider ways and means of defending themselves. To the West the infant Colony
had the unreliable Temnes under King Tom and King Jimmy, and to the East established Slave Trading Stations, Signor Domingo near
Kissy, the French at Gambia Island, and the English (The Anderson Brothers) at Bunce Island.

In honour of the Chairman of the Sierra Leone Company, Henry Thornton, Esq., M.P., a well established Banker in the City of
London, a small hill about half-a-mile from the waterside was soon named Thornton Hill.

From the very foundation of the Colony difficulties arose between the Colonists and the representatives of the Company and among
the first was the delay in the allotment of land. Clarkson returned to England in December, 1792, and on the assurance of his
surveyor promised the settlers that in two weeks time their allotments would be ready. But Mrs. Anna Maria Falconbridge under the
date January 2, 1793 writes:

“The Surveyor has stopped surveying the lots of land for the settlers although he assured Mr. Clarkson that they should have them
in a fortnight. His attention is now being taken up with fortifications which seems to be the hobby horse of Mr. Dawes and a
large fort is planned out upon a hill half-a-mile from the waterside. The new Fort if finished on the plan proposed will cost
£20,000 I hear gentlemen of information say.”

This is the earliest reference to Fort Thornton and these Bastions probably date from 1793.

The Fort was not ready in 1796 when in Governor Macauley’s time the French destroyed Freetown. At first there were the outer
Bastions and inside wooden buildings which included from time to time a home for the Governor, and until the erection of the
Barracks on Tower Hill quarters for the Royal African Corps, the Secretariat and Post Office were first built in 1808. Various
additions and alterations have been made to Government House during which the Bastions to the West were covered up and
incorporated in the building as it was from 1923 to 1949.

In 1949 the old Government House was pulled down to make way for a new one on the same site and the West side old Bastions
exposed. They can now be seen until such time as they are once more incorporated but not destroyed in the new Government House
arising over them. At the time of the attack of the Temnes in 1801 the Fort was not yet complete and at one time the enemy
entered the precincts of the Fort.